This is what I need to believe: good evidence along with good arguments. This is what the Christian needs when it comes to the other religions he rejects: good evidence along with good arguments. If a Muslim argues that the Christian simply refuses to believe in Allah because of a hardened heart, the Christian will scoff at the suggestion just as I do when a Christian says I refuse to believe in Jesus because of a hardened heart, so let’s just dismiss this as any kind of explanation for why I don’t believe, okay? We all need good evidence along with good arguments to believe, and all of us claim this to be the case. But we also must admit some people are brainwashed into believing. The best and only antidote to delusional beliefs is good evidence along with good arguments.

I’ve already articulated some of the kinds of evidence I need to believe: just click here. But this evidence does not exist. What good evidence is there to believe Christianity, the particular local one you believe in, Christian? There is no external evidence that shows any miracle occurred. There is no archaeological evidence for the Exodus or the Canaanite conquest. There is no external evidence for Noah’s flood. There is no external evidence that Daniel was saved from the lion’s den. There is no external evidence that Jesus was born of a virgin in Bethlehem. There is no external evidence that Jesus was transfigured before the eyes of his disciples. There is no external evidence for the resurrection of Jesus, either, nor can such evidence be found in the Turin Shroud. There is none as in N-O-N-E!

The Christian claims that evidence of the universe’s complexity points to a designer. But even if so, and there are good reasons to doubt this, what reason can be found for not thinking this universe is the result of the last act of some god as he was dying in which he merely started the quantum fluctuation that produced this universe? And even if this universe was designed by this god, or some other god like Allah, why is there so much unintelligent design found in it, including so many natural disasters? The supposed fall of Adam and Eve in the garden is pure myth, but even if true, it does not account for what we see in this so-called designed universe for so many reasons I don’t know where to start, except to say that the designer must be blamed for not providing them the needed evidence to believe him, otherwise they would never had sinned in the first place! And it is sheer barbarism to punish all of the children who suffer in this world for the sin of Adam and Eve.

The Christian claims he has the evidence of morals that point to a moral lawgiver. But again, if there is a moral lawgiver, then this does not show us that Yahweh exists over Allah or some other god. And there are good reasons to doubt this anyway, given the Euthyphro dilemma and the fact that it does absolutely no good to say there is a moral law when Christians cannot provide any agreed upon specifics about what that so-called moral law is when it comes to the myriad disputes they themselves have had over what God requires of them down through the ages.

The Christian claims there is good evidence for the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. But this evidence is mainly internal to the canonized New Testament texts and gospels which were redacted from oral story-telling and various non-inspired written accounts of the life and death of Jesus. This Jesus is best thought of as merely another failed Jewish apocalyptic doomsday prophet, and nothing more. And so upon his shocking crucifixion his disciples had visionary experiences of him and concluded just like the Millerites, the Jehovah’s witnesses, and other similar religious groups that their God was providing a new direction for their cult. In the case of the early disciples they concluded from these visions that Jesus was still alive and that the end of the world (the eschaton) would come very soon in their lifetime. Besides, historical evidence is very poor evidence to believe in extraordinary claims like Christians must believe in anyway.

Lastly, but probably not exhaustively, Christians will claim they have a religious experience which counts as good evidence for what they believe, like an inner witness of the Holy Spirit. This is so bogus of an argument it’s hard to even start. Every religious believer of almost every particular religious faith will claim they too have had veridical religious experiences to support what they believe, so religious experiences are entirely untrustworthy to decide which religious truth claims are the correct ones. I’ve already provided a way to test these experiences right here, and I critiqued William Lane Craig’s defense of the inner witness of the Holy Spirit in several places, the links of which can be found in this last post.

Apart from the design argument mentioned above, what about the other arguments for the existence of the Christian God? Suffice it to say that at best, if they all work, they only conclude that a deist god exists, and that kind of God is so far removed from the triune God believed by Christians in the Bible that it’s like trying to fly a plane to the moon…it cannot be done. But in fact none of these arguments can give any good reason for why the Christian God does not have the same problems with regard to how he himself exists as a fully formed 3 in 1 eternal being who has never learned anything new because he supposedly knows all things, and so forth. Where did he come from? It is a nonanswer to merely parrot back to me that "he always has existed." That's a mere language game I don't buy into. Explain it. If you can't do this then the simpler brute fact excludes such a complex being by virtue of Ockham's razor.

Christian, since you and I believe there are many people in the world today who are deluded by their religious beliefs, including brainwashed people in the so called “cults” that need “deprogramming," how do you know that you are not one of them having been brainwashed by the very culture you were brought up in? How do you know? You must consider this a possibility for it’s a fact that brainwashed people do not know they have been brainwashed. It matters not how many people believe as you do in your own culture. They may be brainwashed with you, just like you think the more than one billion Muslims have been brainwashed. You need to clearly think about these sorts of things. Read my links. Think about them. My claim is that you are brainwashed. I’m here to help you. Demand good evidence along with good reasons for why you believe, or cease believing. It’s that simple. You do it with everything else you accept. Do the same here.

I honestly think that I was brainwashed by the Christian culture I was raised in. Now I demand evidence to believe along with good arguments. I adjure the Christian believer to do likewise. Do not believe upon insufficient evidence or poor arguments. Do not believe just what you were taught to believe, for again, as far as you know the people and the culture who taught you what to believe may be brainwashed as well, just like you claim this of the Muslims, the Mormons, and the Hindus who were all raised in their own particular religious cultures.

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I know there are many Christians who read this Blog who refuse to get and read my book that offers a sustained critique of Christianity. It's getting some pretty good reviews. To test whether or not you are one of the brainwashed ones you owe it to yourselves to get and read it.